In installment 6, I noticed that the microadjuster knob did not work until I had turned it 50 clicks or so in the same direction, and then it did not work in the other direction until I turned it 50 clicks. I diagnosed the problem as screws in the LS Positioner that should have been tightened during manufacture, but were not. I also determined that I did not want to attempt to fix it until I got advice from Incra tech support. (See earlier post for more details.)

I sent a detailed email with a picture indicating which part was loose to Mark Mueller at Incra, Saturday morning at 10:30AM ET. I was unhappy that I would have to wait until Monday for the solution. But Mark replied at 9:30AM ET Sunday – less than 24 hours after I wrote, and ON SUNDAY with the solution. He says he has never seen this problem before, and I believe him. I bet it won’t happen again, because he’ll be talking to manufacturing about it.

Just in case it does, though, here’s his solution.

The Proposed Solution

“The fix will take 5 minutes, maybe 10 for someone that’s never worked on the threaded element. Removing the red lever will give you access to the two screws that retain the threaded element; pull out the plugs at the ends of the axle that the lever pivots on and use a Phillips screwdriver or the black-handled hex tool to push the axle out of the base housing. Don’t lose the two black nylon washers on the axle on either side of the lever.

I did not time it, but I think it took maybe 7 minutes. The hardest part was getting the two black nylon washers back onto the axle, especially the second one. I used needle-nosed plyers to get the second one in place, and with some mickey-mouse eventually the shaft went through it.

I brought out the SuperBar (miter slot bar with gauge attached, used for truing blade to slot), put it in contact with the fence, put the fence in microadjust mode, and rotated the microadjuster a few clicks in each direction. With each click, the gauge changed by one mil. Amazing!

I re-zeroed the fence to the blade, set to one inch, cut a scrap. As Incra suggests, I measured the error amount in mils (1/1000”) with my digital caliper, rotated the dial that many clicks. I adjusted the dial to set it to zero. Then I reset the metal ruler so it was exactly on one inch.

I took another test scrap and set the fence to 1.5 inches. Cut it: dead on!

Conclusions for Phase I

My early experience with this fence is that I can truly expect to set he fence to the desired width, cut, and get exactly that width (to a mil or two accuracy). However, re-zeroing the fence will be required any time the positioner base unit is moved. This concludes Phase I of the revamp of my saw.

UPDATE 8/31 on this conclusion: see Part 9.

Goals for Phase II

In Phase II I want to build a new, improved extension table, and make it thicker to be suitable to support a router. In this phase I will also set up the Incra Super Fence that came with this unit, and test it with the router. I want to build some small storage units in unused space in the saw, to store calibration and measuring tools, as well as the wrenches that come with the saw, etc.

Now that the fence is installed, and the Delta Uniguard too, here are some pictures of the front and rear to compare to the picture in the first installment of this series: